The woman and the dog stopped when they saw the School-teacher standing by the spring. But the child greeted the stranger in his baby dialect.
“How-da-do man,” he said. He went on, the little feet tottering over the uneven path. When he reached the Schoolteacher, he spoke again.
“Up-a-go,” he said.
The man stooped and lifted the child into his arms. The sunny smile that lighted the baby face seemed to enter and illumine his own. Something of it, too, moved into the face of the woman, but the cast there of perpetual melancholy seemed loath to depart, as though the muscles were unaccustomed to a change.
The child turned about in the man's arms, and pointed his finger toward two catbirds that were fluttering in a neighboring bush.
“Giggles,” he said.
The manner in which the woman's big melancholy eyes followed every motion of the little boy indicated how her heart enveloped him. He was evidently her one treasure. The smile, struggling to possess the woman's face, seemed to descend and sweeten her mouth.
“He means them birds,” she said. “He's got a kind a talk of his own.”
“I understand him perfectly,” said the man.
“Do you?” said the woman, the smile gaining in her face. “I thought nobody could understand him but me. You must take to little children.”